Halloween: Masks
by Tryon Studios
Summary: Five years after Michael Myers carved a bloody path through Haddonfield, Illinois, 13-year-old Bradley Chambers is excited to take part in the holiday. But as All Hallows' Eve approaches, strange and horrific events leave Bradley suspicious that someone is watching his family. Someone who can't be alive. Someone in the dark. Someone in a mask.


HALLOWEEN

**MASKS**

**Written By**

**DEVON HEFFER**

**Story By**

**JASON R. LATHAM**

**DEVON HEFFER**

**Based on characters created by:**

**JOHN CARPENTER AND DEBRA HILL**

_10/31/83_

The antiseptic smell of the ambulance is an assault on Bradley's sinuses. Underneath it a faint fecal tinge. Someone just hosed down the paddy wagon, now jouncing its way through back-country roads. From where Bradley is seated, cuffed to an aluminum railing, he can't see much. Diamond plate chrome flooring. Cold vinyl walls. A barred window to the cab up front. A window through which he can hear everything.

"Thirteen? You gotta be kidding."

"I shit you not."

"I don't buy it. That kid's big, but he ain't big enough for that bloodbath back there. No one's big enough for that."

"Well, one guy was."

"Yeah. I guess."

The wagon galumphs over a pothole, driving Bradley's tailbone up into his spine.

"IT WASN'T ME! I DIDN'T DO THIS!" Fluorescent lights slide overhead as Bradley's gurney races down the hall. He's strapped down.

He fills his lungs again. "I'm serious! It was Michael! _Myers_! He killed my dog! He killed my friends! He's going to kill -"

Hairy knuckles force a pink terry washcloth into Bradley's mouth. A rubber gag is strapped around his face.

"Fucking kid."

The gurney slams through a series of swinging double doors with "Smith's Grove Children's Ward" emblazoned on them in puke-green. Bradley can see other kids as he passes. Bathrobes. Dead stares. Drool by the quart.

Finally the gurney stops rolling and Hairy Knuckles jerks the straps off of Bradley. He grins as he removes the rubber gag and digs the cloth out of Bradley's mouth. As Bradley begins to sit up, Hairy's meaty paw slams him back down to the gurney. His fingers grip in as he leans down close.

"Now you play nice."

And he's gone.

Bradley sits up slowly, looking around at the drab, white room. A clock dials in the corner. A heating vent kicks on overhead. Bradley turns around and seated behind an aluminum desk is a prim woman wearing a cardigan over a white nurse's uniform. The nameplate on her desk reads "Marion Chambers, RN, NPP, PNP". And for the first time, Bradley feels like someone will believe him.

"Aunt Marion! Thank god you're here! You gotta listen to -"

"Stop talking, Bradley. This isn't going to go the way you want it." Suddenly, Bradley doesn't feel so safe anymore.

* * *

_The Diary of Jessica Chambers_

_10/8/83_

I gotta get out of Langdon. This town is killing me. Or maybe it's just my family. Dad's dead to the world. Bradley's acting weird. Again. This time it's Halloween. He's really going overboard this year. I can't blame him, I guess. We haven't had a real Halloween in 5 years. Since everything over in Haddonfield. But it's still a month out. I mean, calm down. He's at the Halloween store on 5th right now looking for a costume. He keeps saying he wants to be "something scary", which I get. But it's the _way_ he says it. "Something _scaaaary_". Like he's on late night TV or something.

We just can't have a repeat of last fall. Max still won't come into the house after what Bradley did. And Bradley's back from the hospital, but he missed so much school they had to hold him back this year. And he's still having a rough time making friends. I think I'm the only one who talks to him.

Anyway, I feel guilty, but I'm probably not going to waste my time trick or treating with my psycho brother. Misty says there's going to be a Halloween party and I need to go. I don't know. You'll remember the last party I went to didn't end so well (vomited on, laughed at, humiliated beyond belief. See Fourth of July entry). Misty says I need to keep trying. I'm 16 now and I have a car. My Gremlin. She says that alone gets me into the right parties. The kind where people don't vomit on the guests. I'd rather just drive out of town and not look back.

I guess I just need to be more like Misty. More outgoing. Happy. She seems like she's having fun with Justin. I think he smells like B.O. and needs to invest in some Oxy, but hey, she likes him. It's just that if being more outgoing means attracting guys like Justin, I think I'll stay introverted thank you very much.

I should just stay home with Max. I can see him through the window. He used to be such a happy dog. The cast is off and that depressing cone around his head is gone. Bradley says what happened to Max was an accident, and I know he feels awful about what happened. He says he does.

* * *

_10/8/83_

The Halloween Shop popped up on 5th last week and Bradley was first in line. When he entered he was struck by the smell first. Plastic-y and sweet. Like all good Halloweens should smell. Bradley always booked it to the back where masks hung in rows upon row of injection-molded horror.

Today Justin was back there putting the last masks on their chromed hooks. Bradley's stomach clenched. Justin was dating Misty: the vision in dungarees that lived just four houses and a duplex down the block.

Misty. Bradley's sister's best friend.

Misty. Who Bradley was positive would give him a second look if he could just lose the 40-or-so extra pounds of baby weight he was carrying around. That's about five babies.

Misty. The girl Bradley knew he could make fall in love with him if he only knew the secret combination. The combination all women keep hidden from all men. The combination Justin appeared to have stumbled upon and used to slip into those dungarees on more than one occasion. This despite one of the worst pizza faces Bradley had ever seen. It wasn't that Justin's face looked like a pizza, it's that he appeared to be rubbing pepperoni into his pores.

Justin finished, adjusting the very last mask and taking a step back to admire his work. Bradley stood next to him, trying to ignore the fact that he was a foot shorter.

"I dunno my man. I just think that last one there goes a little too far," Justin gestured to the sickly white mask in the middle. Bradley identified it immediately. It was Michael Myers' mask. Anyone in the world might know that mask, but everyone in Langdon definitely knew it. Being one town over from the site of a mass murder comes with its own set of baggage.

"Who makes it?" Bradley asked.

"Some Irish company. Must be a big seller though, otherwise they wouldn't ship it here of all places. Bet you a dollar it doesn't sell. I'm more a Wolfman man myself!" Justin pulled a hairy brown wolf's head off the wall and stuffed his white-headed face inside. "Buggah buggah!" He shook his head violently, sending a synthetic rain of hair fibers to the floor.

Bradley knew his horror monsters, and was always willing to educate the less informed. "The Wolfman doesn't say 'buggah buggah', retard."

Justin hauled off and punched Bradley in the arm, sending Bradley sprawling to the linoleum amid the fake hair of one thousand cheap masks.

"Awww, shit. I gotta sweep all that up. Hey Bradley, pick yourself up, brush all that hair off of you, and buy something or get the hell out." Justin replaced the Wolfman mask and sauntered into the back for a broom. Bradley stood up, ignoring the bruise that was surely spreading on his left bicep.

On the way out he spotted a pair of x-ray specs (_See the bones in your hand! See through clothes!_) He snagged them and ran through the double-doors into the Indian summer.

* * *

Anyone observing 5th Avenue in Langdon, Illinois on October 8, 1983 at 6:23 in the evening would see beat-up Chryslers parked along a sparsely trafficked main drag; boarded up storefronts casting long shadows in the receding light. The victims of a Recession the likes of which Langdon hadn't seen in 50 years; and a tall, imposingly fat kid wearing stupid novelty glasses staggering down the sidewalk.

Turns out x-ray specs don't work.

Bradley discovered this as he trudged homeward from The Halloween Shop. It was unusually warm in Illinois that autumn and Bradley had to remove his windbreaker to keep from breaking a sweat. Unfortunately he couldn't remove the baby weight, so he was drenched soon enough.

The glasses had two layers of cardboard where lenses should be, with tiny holes punched in the middle. Stretched across those holes were what looked to Bradley like the vanes of a feather - very thin, very light strings arranged in horizontal rows.

He wasn't sure how looking through a feather could help you see through stuff, and couldn't figure out why anyone would shell out cash for such a transparent scam. To swipe money from unsuspecting suckers looking forward to seeing though walls.

Or clothes, even. Denim that already clung tight to heart-shaped body parts. A sucker almost wouldn't need the glasses for something like that, but the sucker would know somehow what lay beyond that denim was even more interesting. More alluring. More inflaming. But with these x-ray glasses, what lay beyond still lay out of sight. It was the kind of thing that would normally make a sucker angry.

But Bradley didn't buy these glasses, so he was ok with it.

That was something he was doing a lot lately. Not getting angry. It was harder than it sounds. Aunt Marion was a psychiatric nurse and one of Bradley's earliest memories was of her handing him a stuffed duck and saying "punch this instead."

Here is Bradley's hand, splayed out before him and seen through novelty x-ray specs. Here is Bradley's hand, blurry and indistinct. Here is Bradley's hand, now in Bradley's pocket because Bradley was already getting bored.

Fuzzy cars. Fuzzy boarded-up stores. A fuzzy shape Bradley didn't recognize.

Bradley stopped and snatched the specs off his face just in time to see a work boot and blue Carhartts slip around the corner of 5th and Dewey. Bradley was immediately embarrassed, which in turn made him angry. Someone was watching him make a fool of himself.

At the corner, nothing. A faint tang of sweat hung in the air.

* * *

"Don't touch the TV. I'm watching it."

The truth was Jessica was reading a book, but when Bradley walked through the front door he could tell she was in no mood. So he sat down next to her on the couch and stared at the television while she stared at her book. _It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown_ was on, although Jessica had the volume turned all the way down. Linus was droning on and on about something imaginary.

Jessica didn't look up from her book. "Did you get anything from the Halloween store?"

Bradley could feel the x-ray specs still stuffed in his pocket. "No."

"Well you still have a couple weeks. Don't you think you're getting a little old for trick-or-treating though? I mean, you're 13."

Bradley thought back to the last time he went trick-or-treating. His mother took him and his sister all around the neighborhood. He was dressed as a pirate, Jessica as a princess. Mom was done up to look like a Marilyn Monroe-esque movie star, although that might've just been Bradley's impression of her. She was always so beautiful.

Late in that evening Bradley's father, a Langdon police officer, would rush to Haddonfield. No one would find out what really happened until the next day. But for those few sweet hours it was a night full of jack-o-lanterns, warm cider, candy and laughter. And family. Bradley couldn't wait to re-create it.

"I haven't been since I was 8."

Jessica put down her book. "Yeah well, you'll probably be flying solo on this one. I have plans." She stared at Bradley's face.

"That's ok," said Bradley, not looking away from the television.

Jessica rolled her eyes. "No it's not, Bradley! I _should_ take you trick-or-treating. You always do this. You always sit on your feelings. Stuff them down so deep that eventually they just explode out. Aunt Marion warned you about this after what happened with Max."

Bradley looked down at his arm. He could barely see where Max had bitten him last year. He was all healed up, but Max had avoided Bradley ever since.

"Yeah, you're right," he said. "I really want you to go trick-or-treating with me. Will you?"

"See. That wasn't so hard was it?" Jessica smiled sweetly. "Before you know it you'll be expressing emotions just like a real person!"

Bradley grinned back. "So you'll come?"

"No." Jessica turned back to her book. "Like I said, I have plans."

* * *

Later that night, Bradley was in his room listening to music. A sad song about dreams and what they're made of. It made Bradley think of Misty, which was nothing new. He thought about Misty a lot when he was alone in his room.

He knew she was just down the street. At her house. Probably in her room. Probably in some state of undress. Probably thinking about Justin.

No!

No, not Justin. Maybe she was thinking about Bradley.

The night air was thick as Bradley made his way down the vine-covered trellis outside of his bedroom window. Humidity so high he felt like he was gulping down the air instead of breathing it. Minutes later he was laboring through the soup, pedaling his Huffy up the street to Misty's house.

He could see a car parked out front. Well, not a car, exactly. An El Camino. A bizarre car/truck hybrid. The front end was a Chevelle, but the back end was all light duty pickup. The El Camino offered the best of both worlds, but delivered neither. A rolling duck-billed platypus in competition orange.

Bradley peered into the truck bed. It was empty except for a Frankenstein monster mask leaning up next to the wheel well.

Now he was around back. Standing underneath a rotting elm tree. Misty's window a glowing lens framing pink ruffles and Pat Benatar posters.

And then there she was. Brown curls. Blue eyes. Tan skin. Bradley held his breath as his sister's best friend bopped into frame, a set of headphones wrapped around her skull. Sadly, Misty wasn't in the state of undress Bradley imagined earlier. But she was wearing tight jeans and a pink sweater, both of which were form-fitting enough for a consolation prize.

Involuntarily, Bradley took a step forward into the moonlight.

And that's when an acne-stuffed face heaved into view. Justin was talking loudly as he peered out of Misty's window. He was trying to tell Misty something over the noise of her headphones. Bradley took a step back into the cool spot in the shadows.

Then Justin reached up and took Misty's headphones off for her. He planted an open-mouthed kiss on her. When Misty dissolved into Justin's embrace, Bradley had had enough.

On the way out, Bradley swung by Misty's mother's vegetable garden and grabbed a garden trowel.

As Bradley pedaled home, he could hear Justin's front driver's side tire hissing as air escaped, the trowel buried in the treads. The hissing noise receded. Now Bradley could hear Max, his dog, barking. Getting louder, angrier, as he approached the house.

* * *

_The Diary of Jessica Chambers_

_10/9/83_

Max died today. Max was killed today. We've had Max for 7 years and today I woke up and found him... I don't even know how to describe it. I went out to fill his bowl and it looked like he was inside the shed. But went I went inside… there was blood. And hair.

He was such a good boy. Max was a sweet, happy, smart, snuggly boy.

Dad had just gotten home in his squad car when I found him. I ran right to the driveway and told him what I saw. Dad made me stay where I was and he went into the back yard. When he came back he looked very pale. Langdon P.D. doesn't see a lot of stuff like this I guess. He was there for Haddonfield, but still I could tell he was very upset. He called Detective Fitzsimmons and they both went inside the shed for a long time. Later they came out with Max's body in a garbage bag.

That was when they started talking to Bradley. Dad sent me to my room so I couldn't hear much, but I could tell they were angry. I called Misty, and she says she totally thinks Bradley did it. I told her I didn't care to hear who she thinks did it; I just wanted someone to talk to. My dog was just killed and now my father and a detective are having a long talk with my brother. I need someone to unload this on, not someone to gossip to. She apologized and started talking about Justin instead. I listened for a while and hung up.

I'm ashamed to admit, Bradley was my first thought too. Max and Bradley never really got along, and after last year they've really kept their distance.

Bradley says Max chewed up a picture of Mom and then bit him. It's true. I saw the picture, and the marks on Bradley's arm.

But Bradley broke Max's leg after that.

_No_. Bradley didn't do this. He and that dog have grown up together. I hope he's telling Dad and Detective Fitzsimmons that.

Besides, I was babysitting Bradley last night. I mean, it's not really "babysitting" when your 13 year old brother spends all of his time in his room while you watch TV. But I could hear music coming from his room all night long. It wasn't him. It just wasn't.

* * *

"I'm going to ask you again, Bradley. And you need to tell me the truth. We all want to find out what happened last night to Max, okay? Where were you?"

Detective Fitzsimmons was being gentle. Soft-spoken. Bradley had known him for years; since before he was even Detective Fitzsimmons. Dad's friend Fitz. Eating on Thanksgiving. Drinking on Labor Day. Laughing with Bradley's father in happier times. Crying when Bradley's mother died of cancer last year.

Now he was looking. Looking straight at Bradley. And he wasn't looking away. Bradley's father sat next to the detective at the kitchen table. He was also looking at Bradley, but Bradley was pretty convinced his father didn't see him. Even now.

"Bradley," Fitz said, "after what happened between you and Max last year, you have to know why we're talking to you about this. You have to know why you're the first person we thought of."

Bradley's memories of that night are dim and shimmery. A photograph of his mother. Deep sadness. Rage. Sharp teeth. Snapping bone.

"I was in my room." Which was true. Bradley wasin his room last night.

"The whole night?" Bradley's father was still in his uniform from the night before, and he looked tired. Sad. Par for the course, really.

"Yes, the whole night." The lie came easily.

"His sister backs that up," Bradley's father said to Fitzsimmons.

"I know she does. I just wanted to hear it from Bradley too." For the first time in the last thirty minutes, the detective's gaze shifted from Bradley's face. He looked to the ceiling, let out a sigh and threw on the brown blazer hanging on the back of the kitchen chair.

"The truth is we're probably not going to find whoever did this, Jeff. What happened last night was terrible, without a doubt. But Langdon P.D. just doesn't have the manpower to devote to this."

Fitzsimmons turned to Bradley. "Bradley, thank you for being honest with me."

Bradley remained silent.

Fitzsimmons and Bradley's father walked to the front door, where Fitz pitched his voice almost to a whisper and leaned in closer.

"All I can say is keep a close eye on the house. Make sure your doors are locked at night. But most importantly keep an eye on that kid. I don't feel like he did this, but I don't know. After what happened to the Myers family anything is possible. Just keep tabs on him will you?"

"Yeah. Ok." Bradley's father gazed back into the kitchen where Bradley was seated, staring out the window to the back shed. He was looking in Bradley's direction, but not at Bradley. He was stuck someplace else. Some other time. It was an expression Bradley and his sister were so familiar with at this point, it had become their father's face. As much a part of him as his green eyes and rosacea-stained cheeks. A portrait of a man who had seen and lost too much, and was uncertain if he could hang on to what little he had left. His daughter. His son. His home.

"Alright Jeff. Get some sleep. They're expecting me at the station in 15, so I'm gonna leave you to it." The door shut behind Fitz and Bradley's father slumped into his easy chair and closed his eyes.

* * *

Ten minutes later Bradley was in the shed.

It was clearly a vicious struggle. Pools of stiffening blood. A large dent in the wall. It was someone big, Bradley could tell that much. He could tell because at some point someone had lifted his dog into the air, and smeared Max's bleeding body across the ceiling. _The ceiling_. Bradley reached up and touched the tin roof. He ran his fingers through the blood.

Bradley sat down on the pitted, rusty floor. Past the flimsy doors he could see his home. His dad was asleep in his chair. His sister was in her room, crying. Bradley didn't feel like crying. Actually, come to think of it, he couldn't remember the last time he cried. Even when his mother died.

But he did get angry. And right now he was angry at whoever slaughtered his dog.

Bradley's father and Detective Fitzsimmons believed Bradley killed Max. He wasn't sure how he felt about that. He was certainly upset that his dog was gone. But being blamed for it was a different feeling altogether. Somewhere between indignation and… pride? Did his father really think Bradley had the wherewithal to do something like this? The iron will it would take to smear a broken body across the ceiling?

As he sat there, Bradley wondered why he couldn't feel a chill in the air. Or hear a low frequency thrum. A lingering sense of the psychic wound opened here last night. How could something so violent happen in one spot, and not taint that spot forever? You should be able to sense something. All Bradley could sense were the birds singing in the trees in his back yard. A sprinkler tut-tutting a few houses down. If Fitzsimmons and Bradley's father had gotten around to mopping up the puddles of blood there would be almost no evidence of what had happened there.

And that's when he saw it.

In one of the pools of congealing gore, Bradley spotted what looked like hair. He crawled on his hands and knees toward the clump.

At first he thought it was Max's hair, no doubt lost during his final throes. But as Bradley drew closer, he saw differently.

The hair was shorter than Max's. It was kinked in a uniform zig-zag. Bradley reached out and touched it and identified it instantly. It wasn't animal hair at all. This was synthetic hair. The kind used for wigs.

Or masks.

* * *

_The Diary of Jess__ica Chambers_

_10/23/83_

Two weeks since Max died and Bradley's in full-fledged freak-out mode. You wouldn't know it to look at him, but I can tell. He doesn't talk about trick or treating at all anymore, but he is spending a lot of time at the Halloween store.

I'm checking on him more often now when I'm supposed to be watching him, and twice in the last two weeks he was missing from his room after lights-out. The window open. His bike gone. I don't know where he goes. I ask him about it and he just mumbles something about Justin and the masks.

* * *

_10/29/83_

_Midnight_

"Justin killed my dog, Justin killed my dog…" over and over. It was the first thing Bradley spoke aloud when he woke up. It was the last thing he said when he went to bed. He wasn't saying it to anyone in particular. He was just amazed at the truth of the statement. The way the sound hit the air and came back to him. It sounded right.

The way Bradley framed it, the twisted bastard must've finished having his way with Misty, found his flattened tire, known what Bradley had done, then ventured into Bradley's backyard and killed Max.

Justin was the only person he knew who came into contact with those crappy masks. The synthetic hair spoke for itself. It was obvious. The only other answer was someone wearing a mask. And the only person Bradley could think of was killed in an explosion five years ago. At least, according to Aunt Marion and his father.

It was after midnight and Bradley stood in the shadows again. Deep in an alleyway across the street from The Halloween Shop. Justin's El Camino was parked nearby and Bradley could see a light on in the back of the store. He had watched Justin and Misty go inside about 45 minutes prior. He tried to keep his thoughts away from what he knew they were doing. Instead his eyes closed and he lost himself in the image.

Laughter opened his eyes. Justin and Misty were exiting the store, hands still disgustingly all over each other. Their voices were indistinct in the night air, but Bradley heard Misty say, "Tomorrow night?"

Justin locked the door behind him and said "Absolutely. Midnight". Bradley would be there.

Suddenly there was movement behind Bradley. A crunching along the alleyway floor like a heavy work boot. Bradley spun and peered into the blackness, straining to hear what came next. All that reached him was the receding sound of Justin's car as it sped away.

As his eyes adjusted to the darkness Bradley began to make out items. A garbage can. A dumpster. Old palettes leaning up against the brick buildings.

A shape. Right beside the dumpster. How had he missed it before? The shape was motionless and staring right back at him. It was large. A dim light spilling from a nearby window was enough to backlight a tuft of fake hair.

It couldn't be?

Bradley stepped backwards into the street lights, then off the curb right onto the cracked pavement of 5th Avenue. Nothing emerged from the alleyway, but Bradley could feel it back there looking at him. Judging him. Weighing him.

Lights hit the side of Bradley's face, pulling out from Dewey and spinning onto 5th. Flashing blue and red, it pulled Bradley into the world again. The squad car had spotted him and was making its way up the street. His bike was still in the alleyway, though. He was trapped. The cruiser pulled up next to him, and Jeff Chambers rolled down the window. He was patrolling alone tonight.

"What the hell is this? Why aren't you home? You have school in the morning!"

The truth was Bradley hadn't been to class in a week. But he wasn't going to tell his father that.

"I was just… I couldn't sleep. I'm still upset about Max and I needed to get out of the house." Seemed plausible.

"After midnight?" Maybe not.

"Yeah… I mean –"

"This is ridiculous. Bradley, how can I do my job if I have to worry about you guys back home? Worry about whether or not you're even in bed! I find you wandering around, in the middle of the _street_ no less, at this hour… get your bike and get in the car. I'm driving you home and this time you're going to stay there."

Bradley turned back to the alleyway. Whatever it was, it was still there. Malignant and stoic. The arrival of a police cruiser hadn't moved it one inch. If Bradley's father were to shine the squad car's spotlight down the length of the alleyway they would see it. The shape was daring them to do it.

"Dad –"

"The bike. Now." Bradley's father spun the spotlight around and aimed it down the black alley. A garbage can. A dumpster. Old palettes. Bradley's bike leaning up against the brick building. But that was it. Whatever had been staring at Bradley was gone now.

His father focused the spot on Bradley's bike. "Put it in the trunk. And that's where it'll stay for a few weeks."

Bradley forced himself to step forward and grab his bike. He hustled back onto the street as his father popped the trunk. Seconds later they were heading home.

But Bradley wouldn't get any sleep that night.

* * *

_10/30/83_

_11 p.m._

Jessica jolted awake as a cold hand clamped over her mouth. She screamed into the flesh as it pressed down.

"SHHHHHH!" Bradley's face was inches from her own. Jessica immediately stopped screaming and grabbed Bradley's wrist, tearing the hand away from her face.

"What the in the world are you thinking you little shit!"

"I need you to drive me to The Halloween Shop. Dad took my bike."

Jessica glanced at her clock-radio. It glowed 11:01 p.m. "Are you crazy!? It's almost midnight. The store is closed."

"I know. There's something happening there tonight and I need to be there for it."

"What? What's happening there?" Jessica hadn't heard about anything, then again it was only a few hours until Halloween. Maybe there was some special event. She was unsure. Misty probably would've told her if there was.

"Just something I need to be there for. Are you driving me or not? If not I gotta start walking."

* * *

Jack-o-lanterns lined the streets on Langdon, slipping past the Gremlin as it sped through the night. By this time next week their grins would be sagging and rotten like toothless old men. Bradley watched them disappear behind the car. Then he turned his attention to Jessica. Her steering wheel spun under her palms as she pulled in front of The Halloween Shop. There was a light on in the back. For the thirtieth time she asked Bradley why they were there. This time he answered.

"I think Misty's in trouble. I think Justin is going to hurt her and we have to stop him."

"I got news for you bud, Justin isn't hurting Misty. At least not in any way she didn't ask for. They've been dating for weeks. Careful. You're going to rip my car apart."

Bradley looked down and realized his fingers were dug into the dash. He pried his hands away, leaving divots in the vinyl. "I think you might be wrong about that. I think Justin is dangerous. Cut the headlights and pull around back. I want to go in through the rear entrance. If he is hurting Misty, we need to get the drop on him."

The back door was locked.

"Welp. Guess your plan just fell apart, Bradley. Let's get back in the car and—"

Bradley had already picked up a chunk of concrete and was walking toward a window right next to the door. Before Jessica could stop him, he hurled it through the pane with a crash that must've been loud enough to wake all of Langdon. He reached through the broken glass and unlocked the door from the inside.

"What the heck are you doing?"

"Shhh! We have to be quiet from here on out." Bradley was through the door into the black of the store. Jessica followed.

To their right was the back stockroom. The light was on, and Jessica stepped toward it. Bradley took another route toward the front of the store.

At first Jessica was surprised by how empty the stockroom was. Broken down boxes and piles of plastic bags littered the floor. But then she looked up at the clock. It read 12:00 a.m. Halloween. All the costume jewelry and Creature from the Black Lagoon masks were sold and the store would soon close for the season. The only interesting item left in the stockroom was an empty cot in the corner, and a faint post-coital scent that hung in the air.

Jessica screwed up her nose at the odor and turned around to leave when she heard a strangled cry from the front.

She raced around the corner to a scene she would have trouble describing hours later.

A wall of empty mask hooks.

Blood.

Hair.

Misty and Justin, impaled on two hooks, hanging like slaughtered cows in a meat freezer.

Jessica filled her lungs to scream, but before she could get anything out she heard Bradley scream.

"_JESSICA!_"

After that… nothing.

* * *

Bradley fell backwards when he saw Misty and Justin. His legs had given out and he knelt in the smear of blood that ran down the side aisle of the store. Blood that came from the still-seeping wounds in Misty and Justin's chests. Misty's glazed eyes cast down on Bradley, judging him silently, even now.

A thump from behind and he saw it. A dark shape stepped from behind one of the far aisles and into the faint light. Blue Carhartts. A ghostly white mask. A synthetic tuft of hair jutting crazily from the fake scalp. A large hunting knife dripped blood onto the floor. Hands cracked and chapped and bloody.

Jessica tore around the corner and skidded to a halt on the blood that slicked the floor. Bradley saw her gaze fill with the broken bodies of her two friends as Myers stepped up behind her. He had to warn her but she wasn't looking at him. Only Misty and Justin.

"_JESSICA!_"

Myers lifted his knife and Bradley screamed as he clocked Jessica over with the head with its burnished steel handle. Jessica folded to the floor with a sickening _whump_.

Bradley stumbled to his feet, then fell back down again as his Keds slid in the blood.

Myers was gigantic, filling Bradley's vision as he stepped forward. He scrambled backward but Myers merely reached down and balled a fist in Bradley's shirt, lifting him to his feet.

Myers raised his knife up to Bradley's left eyeball. Bradley could feel the point digging at his tear duct. He forced himself to stiffen, knowing that even a tremble would plunge his eye into the blade.

Myers leaned forward and Bradley could smell his rotten breath rattling behind his mask. The mask pushed closer until the rubber touched Bradley's nose. The eyes were dead and glazed over just like Misty's. But there was something there. An animal presence. It was the look a mountain lion gives an elk. Or the look a deadly virus would give an innocent child, had the virus eyes. Myers gives nothing. He takes everything. He took Bradley's dog. He took Bradley's love. Now he would take Bradley.

Suddenly Myers released Bradley and stepped back. Bradley scuttled backwards into the mask hooks and felt Justin's dead knees dig into his back. Myers slowly moved around Bradley to Misty and lifter her blood drenched shirt, snagging it on the mask hook protruding from her chest. Underneath was his canvas, and he began to write.

Bradley's mouth gaped open in horror as he watched Myers cut into Misty, her flesh splitting easily, as if the words were always there. Waiting to come into relief.

_JESS NEXT _

_HAVE FUN_

As Bradley slipped into blackness, he could feel Myers press the handle of the knife into his hand.

* * *

Anyone observing 5th Avenue in Langdon, Illinois on October 31, 1983 at 9:23 in the morning would see flashing police lights peppering the main drag; police tape blanketing a now-closed Halloween shop; and a teenaged girl with a bandage around her head sobbing inconsolably on the curb, her father's hand resting on her shoulder.

Nearby, a middle-aged couple clutched each other as their bodies convulsed with grief, the strange waltz parents of dead children always perform when they hear the news. Suddenly Misty's mother tore her face from her husband's shoulder.

"He's crazy! He's crazy! He's crazy! He's cr—" Her voice was muffled again in her husband's chest.

Jessica reached to her shoulder and clutched her father's hand. They both looked at the storefront, watching Bradley being led away in cuffs. Detective Fitzsimmons had a hand on the back of the boy's neck, steering him toward the waiting paddy wagon. As he loaded Bradley inside, he looked back at Jeff Chambers. Bradley's father couldn't meet his friend's eye.

After the paddy wagon rolled away, Fitzsimmons came over to Jessica and her father. It was still early in the morning, and he looked dead tired.

"I'm so sorry about this, Jeff. Jessica."

They were silent.

"We should've been more proactive after Max was killed," Fitzsimmons said. "It's too late now. And Jessica, he's sent you a very clear threat. We need to put him away and have a very long talk with him now."

Jessica wasn't sure how to respond. "I – I still don't think – I mean, it looks really bad."

"Bradley killed your friends and then said you were next. We found the knife in his hand. He's still just a kid, but it's clear he's capable of much more than the average 13-year-old."

Fitz looked down 5th Avenue as the paddy wagon crested a hill on the outskirts of town.

"We need to keep you and your father safe. Bradley will be at Smith's Grove with your aunt. Maybe in a couple months you can visit him."

"No," Jessica's father said.

"What?" Fitzsimmons and Jessica replied in unison.

"Jessica can't visit Bradley. We've lost too much already. No more. Jessica, I don't want you visiting your brother. We end this here."

* * *

_The Diary of Jessica Chambers_

_11/2/83_

Dad didn't go to work today. He's downstairs in the kitchen. After he told me I couldn't ever visit Bradley at Smith's Grove, he stopped talking. He just sits there staring out the window at the shed. I brought him something to drink a couple minutes ago, but I'm sure he hasn't touched it. He's not moving.

Misty's parents won't talk to me. I can't blame them after what happened. What happened to Misty. I'm going to assume there will be a service of some sort, but I don't know if I will be welcome there.

The temperature finally broke and it's suddenly cold. It feels like November.

My head still hurts from the other night. The paramedics said they found me on my back, so I think I must've slipped in all the blood.

So much blood. I don't know why he did what he did. Or why he wants to do the same to me.

Bradley is with Aunt Marion now. She called earlier to say he arrived okay. She says he's lashing out and they've had to sedate him. I don't like to think of him sitting there staring out a window like Dad, but I imagine that's exactly what he's doing.

I need to get out of Langdon. Just get in a car and drive somewhere. Start over. Go to school. Get a job. Anything. But when I think about it, I don't know if I'll ever be able to. Dad needs me. Bradley will need me someday. Someday he'll be able to tell me the truth about what happened. About why he decided he needed to kill Misty and Justin. I need to be here for that.

It's cold. I think someone left the door open downstairs.

* * *

Bradley's breath fogs the bay window, obscuring his view of the gray grounds beneath him. He wants to reach up and wipe the fog away, but his arm weighs one hundred pounds. His head weighs one thousand, locked to his shoulders.

He rolls his eyes to the right to see Aunt Marion talking with Hairy Knuckles at the end of the rec ward. Hairy had shoved three yellow pills down Bradley's throat about a half hour ago.

Now Bradley stares.

Aunt Marion glances in his direction briefly, but then looks away. He thinks he can read her lips. She's saying, "Michael…" To which Hairy lets out a loud guffaw. Aunt Marion doesn't join him. She looks worried. Bradley brings his eyes back to the window.

He needs to warn Jessica. He needs to tell her Michael Myers is coming. Needs to stand up and make Aunt Marion understand that Myers is back and that he is coming. Bradley grips the armrest and tries to stand but he feels like he left his legs back in The Halloween Shop. His fingers grip harder, but it's all he can muster.

Bradley continues to look out the window. The gray fog of his breath is replaced with the gray fog of early November. The line of trees at the edge of the property hold back the greater world from Smith's Grove. Bradley tries to look through the trees, hoping he can look all the way back to his house. All the way through the back door and past his father in the kitchen, up the shag-carpeted stairs.

He reaches his cracked and bloody hand up to open Jessica's bedroom door. He can see Jessica sitting at her desk, back to the door, scribbling away in her diary.

He tries to shout. To scream. He's coming! But can only manage a mumble.

"He's out there. He's out there. He's really out there. He's out there. He's out there –"

He's there.


End file.
